14.3.2019 Friedrichshafen/Hong Kong. Since 2016, ZF and Venturi combines a technology partnership in the FIA formula e championship For the fifth season, ZF has developed an electric drive for the Venturi Team, which includes an electric Motor, a newly developed transmission and the power electronics.
In the three-month Break between the last race of the season 4 and the first race of the season 5, ZF, guided, engineers way, which is not possible in series development, tested limits, and benefited especially from the System of Know-how of the group. Now it has been rewarded with the first victory and fifth place in this season, the previous development work. At the same time, in the race purchased and tested Know-how are impulses, which are incorporated directly in the series development.
“We don’t just develop electric engines for Cars, buses and commercial vehicles; our specially developed technique is to be used in extreme Racing applications where every watt-second of the battery, maximum efficiency, and at the end of each hundredth of a second,” says Jörg Grotendorst, head of the ZF Division E-Mobility. The most recent example of this is the claim of the system provider for the formula E developed E-drive with a maximum output of 250 kW for the cars of the Monaco-based team Venturi.
At the last formula E race in Hong Kong, Edoardo Mortara drove the first race win for Venturi. A great fifth place of the Ex-formula 1 pilot Felipe Massa, the so far most successful racing weekend completed the end for the partners, Venturi and ZF.
Content
- Full Speed already in development
- System approach brings higher efficiency and low weight
- The impetus for the series development
Full Speed already in development
“It is fascinating technology for racing and adapt, and to focus especially on Performance, and the hunt for tenths of a second”, Tobias Hofmann, project Manager for the formula E-drive. “Within a few months, the concept for the drive, because up to the first Tests on the track only one and a half years time.” In this period, managed the ZF engineers from the concept through the part procurement, and Test on the test bench, to provide a high-performance drive, on the legs, then rode a further eight months later his first race in Saudi Arabia. “The development phase was highly dynamic and characterised the grinding of numerous variable and short-term Changes and Design,” explains Hofmann. Essential requirements for the drive were a late –for example, the “Attack Mode”, the pilots briefly 25 kW more power for Overtaking.
In contrast, a high durability, from the beginning, as a Parameter, in addition to increase in efficiency and a maximum of weight saving: The drive components of the formula-E-cars in the 13 races a season with a total of over 5,000 racing and Qualifying miles. The Teams are allowed to replace the drive components by vehicle only once, another exchange has met time-sensitive.
System approach brings higher efficiency and low weight
In order to combine maximum efficiency and weight savings together, played, and ZF is its system competence. The E-drive is achieved with a specifically designed Translation, as well as power electronics, ultra-low system weight and a degree of efficiency that is significantly higher than the of serial applications. First, the combination of material knowledge, experience in gearing technology, including the optimal lubrication and cooling, as well as the latest Trends for power electronics in optimum overall package. “Individual measures without this system approach would be dissipated in its effect,” says Hofmann.
For example, ZF set up for the gear housing, a metallic, lightweight alloy, in the housing of the power electronics even Carbon, both materials are lower in comparison to classical materials the weight significantly. Thus, the overall weight savings could be realized by the end of – concept of a highly efficient gear ratio, had to go to the engineers at the cooling and lubrication new ways. A dry-sump lubrication increases the efficiency in the transmission gear. The power electronics, the ZF Team was the first to silicon carbide as the semiconductor. Chipsets from silicon carbide can be ten times thinner artist than their current counterparts made of silicon, which generates a lower internal resistance. In the result, efficiency and range of the battery to rise.
The impetus for the series development
“The experience we have made with the Racing application, in many cases have an impact on the future of ZF products, explains Jörg Grotendorst.
An example of the silicon carbide in power electronics, the series use ZF’s plant in about three to four years. The experience and data, the ZF now collects in the formula E, will be fed directly into the development of this new technology. Concepts developed by ZF especially for the Racing application, will find the way in a series of applications, for example, a special winding method for the Stator of the E-machine.
On the test system, the development of electric motor sport drive. In the case of a drive, the main focus is on efficiency, it is on every Detail. In connection with System efficiencies, which are close to the ideal 100 percent, it means this is a high requirement to the measurement accuracy of the Test environment. Such a precise Setup brings advantages in the testing of the ZF pre-production projects.
And so, the need to overcome under the pressure of time limits and to follow new paths, will be reflected in future development projects: “the development of the system with many open parameters is, in principle, in the case of a New Automotive Customer’, such as manufacturers of electric mini-buses and vans, similar as in the case of a Motorsport project,” says Hofmann, The performance of the ZF engineers to come even without sophisticated specifications to a viable concept and a system design approach prove to be a competitive advantage want.
With electric power from ZF in Hong Kong victory in the formula E get: Venturi Pilot Edoardo Mortara (left) wins, team-mate Felipe Massa secures with a ranking of five of the so far best placement in his opening season. (Photo: ZF Friedrichshafen AG9
